Top Stories

TOKYO: The live television music event MTV Video Music Aid Japan, featuring entertainers such as Lady Gaga, is slated to air on June 25 in Asia, with all proceeds going to the Japanese Red Cross. Top stars in global, regional …

LONDON: Among the highlights on BBC Two’s upcoming slate is the new drama The Hour, which goes behind the scenes of a topical news program from the ’50s, along with a host of other shows that span factual, comedy, science, …

BUDAPEST: The international reality hits Big Brother and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, among others, are to air in Ukraine this year, following new deals from Endemol. Endemol Poland is producing Big Brother, of which the first season has been picked …

LONDON: Sony Pictures Television (SPT) and British production exec Victoria Ashbourne have launched a new joint-venture company, Victory Television, which will focus on entertainment and factual entertainment programming for the U.K. market. The venture is led by Ashbourne, who was …

MIAMI: The widely distributed Telemundo novela Aurora has premiered in Romania and Lithuania. On Monday, Aurora aired on channel TV3 in Lithuania and on Acasa TV in Romania. It has been picked up in more than 15 countries and is …

LONDON: Sony Pictures Television’s 2waytraffic has scored a commission to relaunch the format Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? in Romania, with Kanal D ordering 36 episodes. The show will play out over three weeks on Kanal D, which will …

ARLINGTON: An American Family: Anniversary Edition, a two-hour film on the 1973 TV show widely considered to be the first reality series ever produced, is to premiere July 7 at 8 p.m. on PBS. An American Family originally ran for …

THE HAGUE: Dutch cable providers UPC and Ziggo will not have to open up their networks to rival platforms, the Commission of the Dutch Independent Post and Telecommunications Authority (OPTA) has said, thanks to the rapid pace of digitization in the …

NEW YORK: Life’s Too Short, a new comedy from The Office co-creators Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, is currently in production for a debut on BBC Two later this year and on HBO in 2012. The seven-episode series is being done …

NEW YORK: The New York Television Festival (NYTVF) has launched a new development initiative focused on pitching, with Sundance Channel, MSN and SevenOne International signed on as inaugural pitch partners. The three companies are signed up to guarantee a development …